But when the troops packed up and left, the power plants fell into disrepair, leaving those locals again without electricity.

Mr Hayes said his company hoped to turn that around on the island of Tonoas, using what the island already had in abundance, sunshine and coconuts.

The project will build an integrated coconut processing facility, re-electrify the island and use solar, batteries, and biomass to power the community.

"So the model is based on reinvigorating the coconut industry and forming a group of grower cooperatives who will supply, on commercial rates, the coconut product to the facility," he said.

He said the leftover husk and shell biomass from that plant would go into energy production for steam, while solar and a small amount of diesel would run the plant and provide electricity to the island.

The processing centre would produce virgin coconut oil and coconut meal to sell, while the biochar would be given back to growers to fertilise their plantations.

Potential to take technology further afield

Mr Hayes said the project was the culmination of four years of research with Vital, the region's state-owned energy supply company.

"The project is fully commercial money, with a business case that sits behind it, so we're going really hard at the coconut collection, the processing and the power side with a view that it works," he said.

"We've done enough work over the past few years to know the model works, now it's just about ironing out the kinks and moving onto rapid expansion."

Curtin University sustainability expert Jemma Green said the project could raise living standards in developing nations across Central Africa, the Indian Ocean and South East Asia.

"I could totally see them [developing nations] leapfrogging centralised and largely fossil fuel-based energy sources, skipping that entirely and putting in these these sorts of systems," she said.

"There are a number of places in high-cost scenarios that don't have power or reliable power."

She also thinks it could play a vital role in regional Australia.

"Even in rural parts of Western Australia that are perhaps on diesel," she said.

"Instead of going to a grid solution with expensive transmission and network costs, they could have microgrids that utilise solar and batteries and use agricultural waste as a backup system instead of diesel."

Balance Utility Solutions is also working on the Mortlocks, a small collection of islands which have never had power.